Review: Dynasty Warriors Gundam 3 (360/PS3)

Dynasty Warriors is a popular series of games that recreate famous battles from the book "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". It is a hack and slash game with some minor RPG elements, such as leveling up your character's abilities, who you are able to choose based on which of the three different clans you want to play as. Your chosen character then has the honor of leading your soldiers into battle, which are massive 'conquer territories' skirmishes where you fight anywhere from 300 to 1,000 troops per mission. The series has been relatively successful, so Tecmo Koei decided to make it even more so by combining their winning formula with giant robots from a famous anime series, thereby bringing you Dynasty Warriors: Gundam.

Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 is, obviously, the third installment in the series, so plenty of changes have been made since the original one first came out. The graphics have been improved and the overall game play mechanics have had a bit of an overhaul. The maps are a bit more developed, and I enjoyed the soundtrack much more than the previous two entries. However, the battle system has remained the same throughout all of the Dynasty Warriors games, so don't expect much of a change in Gundam 3.

The Dynasty Warriors: Gundam spin-offs work a bit differently than the normal Dynasty Warriors games. In Dynasty Warriors you normally have one of a variety of objectives, such as kill the leader, or head to this point on the map and secure it, etc. The Gundam versions' mission objective is to take over bases and bring the enemy morale down, which makes the leader show up. You then kill him and end the mission. Basically, every mission is the exact same regardless of what they ask you to do. There are certain bases that you can capture that help raise moral or do other little things to help change the tide of battle a bit, but over-all, you are going to end up playing the missions the same way each time.

The story is pretty bad, in fact I was actually skipping through the storyline during my 30+ hours of game play just to get to the fighting. The story is, in a nutshell, about how all of the famous Gundam characters from all of the different Gundam series follow a strange signal and end up on a planet where things are "distorted". You are never told what's making the world distorted, but all of the characters seem very distraught about it, so it must be bad. The characters break off into three different groups, causing three different storylines (seems like a Dynasty Warriors trademark) that eventually coalesce into two different stories.....apparently one storyline gets lost somewhere along the way. The three storylines are all really bland and all of them talk about the exact same thing. Whittling it down to two stories doesn't help either, as they also seem to be exactly the same. Now, I'll be fair and admit I didn't finish Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3, so the storylines could have magically developed into some sort of masterpiece in the last few hours of the game, but I highly doubt it. At least, they weren't going anywhere when I stopped. 

The best part about this game, like all Dynasty Warriors games, is the insane amount of missions to go on. Even if they do end up playing pretty similarly in this iteration, there are tons of them for you to do. Depending on which missions you choose, you gain new parts to put on your Gundam, or unlock higher-tiered Gundams to use in battle. These missions also unlock new pilots, operators, and various other things as well.

All in all, despite its huge flaws, there was a reason I played this game for 30+ hours. I am a big fan of Dynasty Warriors games simply because I love being an overpowered person that kills hundreds of enemies in a single stroke, and being able to do that while sitting in my favorite giant robots made it a 1,000,000 times better. If you also enjoy the Dynasty Warriors games, and especially if you love Gundams, you should pick it up just for that. You'll just have to skip the story.... but with giant, awesome, robot Gundams, who needs that anyways?

Submitted by: Jason Hald

Import Review: The Last Story (Wii)

'The Last Story' is the latest RPG from MistWalker Studios, which also brought us 'Lost Odyssey' for the 360. Its founder is the 'father of Final Fantasy', Hironobu Sakaguchi, so it's hardly lacking in pedigree. It's exclusively for the Wii console, and as of writing this, exclusive to Japan. Operation Rainfall, a massive online campaign to bring 'The Last Story', 'Pandora's Tower' and 'Xenoblade' to the States, is trying to change that, but whether or not they will have any success remains to be seen.

The game immediately throws you into the thick of things, starting you off with a stage that serves as both the basic introduction of the story and a tutorial. You play as Elza, a young man who is part of a mercenary squad, battling through an island infested with lizard-men and re-animated skeletons in hopes of finding artifacts and riches in the crypts there. During the course of this tutorial level, you and your group fall into a skeleton ambush attack. Your female companion is killed in the battle that follows, and in his rage and grief, with images of his brutally slaughtered mother filling his head, Elza raises his head and screams. What he didn't count on, however, was an answer. A presence, a spirit of some kind, residing in the crystal walls of the cave they find themselves trapped in, tells Elza that she's been waiting for a heart like his, filled with loneliness and grief, and that she will give him the power to protect what's important to him. Elza then receives that power, represented by some sort of glowing arm tattoo, and immediately uses it to resurrect his friend and kill the remaining skeletons single-handedly. Thus ends your tutorial, and your adventure begins.

The world is interesting, as mercenaries are looked down upon as some sort of second-class citizens, which provides an interesting dynamic. Random villagers you meet later on will openly heckle you, or recoil in disgust, when they find out what you are. As the world seems to be prejudiced against you, that makes the relationship between Elza and the other members in your mercenary group that much more important. When you are at inns or other bases, you can have various conversations with the other mercenaries, with even the occasional opportunity to choose between two different answers, which effect how they respond to you later on. Not that deeply, however, as the conversations are still rather linear and straight-forward, and are no where near the level of 'Dragon Age: Origins' or even the 'Mass Effect' conversation wheel in terms of depth and consequences.

The character design is quite nice, but it is a little typical Japanese RPG looking, and definitely shows the 'Final Fantasy' influence from Sakaguchi being at the helm. What's neat about the characters, though, is that you can change the colors of each individual piece of clothing on whoever is currently in your party, making it that much more personal to your individual tastes. The monster design is good as well, but the bosses are what really stand out.  There wasn't a single boss that didn't make me say 'whoa....that's pretty cool....' as soon as it revealed itself.

The most interesting aspect of this game to me, though, is the combat system. It's not your traditional RPG turn-based combat battle game at all. You only control Elza, while the other three members of your party are computer controlled, at least during the single-player campaign. Their AI is surprisingly well-behaved, and actually (gasp!) helpful at times, which is a nice change from what one usually sees. It's especially impressive since 'The Last Story' is not a turn-based RPG, but an action one. You, as Elza, and the rest of your party are free to roam around the area, attacking swarms of enemies that are also quite active in their movements. Slabs of rock laying around the map can be jumped over, and even used as cover from enemy attacks. Little arrows of light (think Final Fantasy XII's combat system for the closest example) point out from your party members to show which enemy they are currently focused on, and vice versa; the arrows also show which enemies are focused on attacking your characters, especially useful when they decide to all gang up on your mage. The arrows are very helpful in the chaos that can sometimes ensue during battle, but they somehow manage to remain unobtrusive, so don't concern yourself about that.

You control Elza's movement with the Nunchuck's control stick, and his basic sword attacks are carried out automatically when you are close enough to an enemy. Special and ranged attacks are not automatic, but have to be brought up by pressing their corresponding buttons, with ranged being controllable either with the Wiimote's motion control, or with the Nunchuck's control stick. You can also choose to play the game with a classic controller, if the Wiimote isn't your thing. Special attacks and movements are unlocked as you level up, such as the slash ability, where you can crouch behind a fallen slab of rock or other cover, and run out and slash your sword across the mid-section of any unfortunate enemy that happens to wander by.

You also have the ability to occasionally order your other party members to perform special actions to help you out during combat. My personal favorite was when I ordered the mage in my party to blow up a near-by stone bridge covered with archers, after which I laid down suppressing arrow fire to keep him protected while he charged up his spell. The bridge blew up quite well, and showered the enemies I was fighting with broken rock, killing them too. Elza also has his weird little magic tattoo ability, which when activated makes him do more attack damage, and allows him to revive dead players, like some sort of walking Phoenix Down. Sound cool? You have no idea. The game is incredibly fun, and what's even better is that it can be played co-op over the internet (it can not be played co-op offline on a single console, which is a shame). Even though the AI is wonderful, from how the characters interact and work together in battle, I imagine playing online with friends would be even better.

It will be a downright shame if this game doesn't make its way to the States at some point. While I admit I initially picked the game up just to try it out and write about it, I found myself continuing to play it, even with my busy schedule, just because I enjoyed it so much.The story, while perhaps a little cookie-cutter Japanese RPG, is interesting, the characters are funny and engaging, and the combat is unique and just plain fun. There is a shortage of good third party games on the Wii as it is, and an even larger shortage of good RPGs on the system. As the Wii U is also supposed to support original Wii games, Nintendo still has time to make a lot of fans happy with this amazing game. Just last week, it was announced that 'The Last Story' will be released in Europe sometime in 2012, but there is still no word on any love for North America. I wish Operation Rainfall every success with their efforts, and hope that they are eventually rewarded with an English version of 'The Last Story' that everyone in the US can enjoy.

Submitted by: Sherrie Blackwell

Retro Review: Mischief Makers (N64)

Way back before Enix and Square merged, they were individual companies that produced much more than just RPGs. In 1997, Enix created a game for the Nintendo 64 called Mischief Makers, a quirky little platformer that can easily contend with the likes of Mario and Donkey Kong in terms of fun and playability.

It's a fun little story that tells of the adventures of a robotic maid named Marina, and her quest to save her creator Professor Theo from the evil clutches of his twin brother. She travels to the planet Clancer to rescue him, and on her way battles and hijinks ensue. The story itself is a little cliche by today's standards, since it's just a basic save the damsel in distress game (except in this case it's a man, so that's new!). However, the story isnt why people play these types of games; it's all about the gameplay, and that's where Mischief Makers really shines.

The game mostly plays like a standard platformer, with a few key differences. First, you have a boost that you can use to propel yourself over large gaps, or to just simply move faster (there is even a race you can compete in!). Secondly, you have no offensive abilities: the only thing you can do is grab and throw. This plays a key role in what makes this game great. Using your grab and throw techniques is the only way to beat bosses and solve puzzles. It's very similar to the way that Super Mario 2 worked, where you can throw enemies into each other. It's not just little enemies you can grab though, you can grab the local people, energy blasts coming at you, and even larger enemies' fists and throw them back in their face! The way this mechanic is implemented is fun and intuitive, and very unique in its design. It's not all just fighting though; in between all the action are puzzles. The levels aren't just a direct path from point A to point B, you have to figure out how to get there through the platforming. It's an absolute blast.

This game is very unique and fun to play, as well as challenging. In order to get 100% completion you must find a gold crystal in every level; if you do so you are treated to a special ending that shows what Marina would look like if she were human, and the style varies depending on what age you put in at the beginning of the game. It's a nice little treat for the completionists out there. So what are you waiting for?! If you aren't one of the lucky few who have already discovered Mischief Makers, then hurry up and get back to the roots of gaming with this hidden gem!!

Submitted by: Tom Ferko (Employee)

Review: 3D Dot Game Heroes (PS3)

I've always been a big fan of 'The Legend of Zelda' series and many other old school RPGs, so the appearance and idea of '3D Dot Game Heroes' was very appealing to me. In a nutshell, you're a hero who sets off on a quest to slay an evil bishop who is set on making the world a miserable place. In true old school RPG fashion, that's all there really is to it. In fact, the whole game is basically a homage to the Legend of Zelda. Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course!

You progress in the game by exploring dungeons, solving puzzles, killing enemies, and collecting items. When your health bar is full, you gain the ability to increase your sword size to tremendous lengths when swung, much like shooting beams out of your sword in Zelda. Other Zelda-like items can be obtained throughout the game, such as boomerangs, lanterns, bombs and bows. The game also has a bestiary of all the enemies you face, which appear once they are defeated. The game is also loaded with Trophies to obtain, so that'll probably keep you busy for a while.

Throughout the game, a lot of subtle references to NES games are made. In fact, the whole style of this game strongly resembles that of the 8-bit action adventure games of the 80's. I love the nostalgia this game brings, and I think it is sure to bring pleasant memories to the oldest of gamers. Even the loading screens feature re-created box art of classic video games using the game's 3D sprites! Speaking of which, yes you read that right: the graphics are in 3D, but the world and characters are all animated like they are made of retro 2D sprites. It's a really interesting visual style; the graphics are just amazing. It's truly a feast for the eyes.

As far as those 2D character sprites go, you have a choice in the beginning of the game from a healthy selection of pre-made characters, or you can make your own with the sprite editor. You can also trade character models with other PSN users. Having certain save data on your system from other games will also add to the character selection in the beginning of the game. For example, a Little Big Planet save file will allow you to play as a 2D Sackboy in 3D Dot Game Heroes.

The game is also incredibly funny and pokes fun at other Atlus games and nerdiness. Experienced gamers will find themselves laughing throughout a majority of the game with its witty and humorous references to other old-school games as well, not just Atlus titles. The soundtrack goes right along with the retro theme, featuring catchy songs that are reminiscent of Legend of Zelda midi themes.

With how much this game plays homage to/ruthlessly mocks old 8-bit RPGs, it can't really be considered a fully original game. However, despite that, or maybe because of it, it is still an amazing game and incredibly fun. This game doesn't make the mistake of taking itself too seriously, and neither should the player. I felt the game was a celebration to geekiness, which is why I loved it! If you're ever in a nostalgic mood, I recommend busting this out instead of trying to find your old NES system in your attic. It's probably faster, and you'll be just as satisfied.

Submitted by: Armando Ibarra (Employee)

Preview: Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword (Wii)

In the history of gaming, not many franchises have commanded respect the same way the Legend of Zelda franchise has. The games were difficult and frustrating, but fun and worth the effort. First released in 1986 for the Nintendo Entertainment System, or NES, which was Nintendo's first home console in North America, Zelda has thrived since its first legendary release. Skyward Sword, the newest addition to the franchise, is in no way a blemish on that great history. Recently I had the chance, while at San Diego Comic Con International, to get my hands on the newest Zelda title. Forget all the complaints you may have heard, or personally hold, about Twilight Princess being too easy, or the art design for Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks being weird; I assure you that Skyward Sword will knock you for a loop so hard you'll forget all about that.

First, it does rely on motion control, and there isn’t any way around it. Sorry to those of you who don’t enjoy this control scheme. However, it is far more accurate than any game I have ever played on the Wii before. Utilizing the Wii’s Motion Plus accessory, the game tracks your motions at almost a one for one ratio. The advanced motion tracking this game uses allows for more intense battles and harder enemies that will be spread throughout the dungeons. The control scheme is also more varied, and doesn't leave you with the impression that you are doing the same thing over and over again.

The demo I was able to play offered three modes for us to experience. The first was a romp through Skyloft, which is Link’s home in the clouds. In it, you find yourself riding on a rather large bird, racing after another large bird which has a statue strapped to its foot. You are not alone though, there are others from Skyloft that are out to bully Link and foil his attempts to win the prize of the race: the Beautiful Zelda, who is just another inhabitant of Skyloft, not of royal blood. The controls in this demo were very fun; the Wii remote is moved up and down in a pseudo-flapping motion, which causes your avian transport to rise in altitude. This allows you to gain more speed by diving back down, and also the ability to dodge items being thrown at you. The Nunchuck’s control stick is used to dictate the direction in which your bird flies. This mode was a bit short, but it did a good job of setting up the atmosphere we will probably all experience at the beginning of Skyward Sword's story, once it's released.

The next mode I was able to sample was the “dungeon battle”, which basically gives you an idea of what a typical dungeon atmosphere will be like. What I like best about this new game is the inherent difficulty in it, which owes its existence entirely to the new motion control advancements of the Motion Plus accessory. Standard enemies block your every move, leaving only small areas open that you have to strike in precisely and quickly before they attack you. The game no longer lets you frantically shake the Wii remote at the TV screen, praying that you kill things. Rather, it makes you think and plan to utilize certain actions against your enemies, such as slicing from an angle or dashing in from the side. You will also have to actually use your shield to block, deflect, and stun enemies before they swarm you. Luckily, weapons and items are much easier to change out and use in Skyward Sword, to compensate for the higher difficulty level. The item menu is gone, and in its place is a small wheel with items arranged around it, brought up by pressing the “B” button.

The final mode available for trial at this demonstration was the “Boss Battle”, which is exactly what it sounds like. In my opinion, this boss was far more difficult than any other in recent Zelda history, partially because he would grab onto the blade of my sword, which was only counterable by instantly drawing back the Wii remote to try and dislodge it. The swift pulling motion would free up my weapon, but by then he would have already charged up an attack: a series of projectiles which I would have to deflect with a quick shield bash. Teleportation, quick movements, and relentless sword attacks were the nature of this boss battle, leaving me with little option but to quickly dash around to his new location, Z target him, and utilize my shield bash to stun him in midst of his furious sword slashing.

All in all, Skyward Sword will be one of the most difficult Zelda games in years, and it will be all the better for it. Not only has the difficulty of old returned, but the fun and satisfaction has as well. It has already attracted the attention of Zelda fans, both new and old, and is currently one of the most anticipated games of this year. From what I saw of it, this game will not disappoint them. The only complaint I had with the demo was that it ended, and entirely too quickly at that. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword will release this holiday season in North America, exclusively for the Nintendo Wii.   

Submitted by: Corey Hall (Employee)